


Ignition

by blueroses_11



Category: Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: Angst, Colonist (Mass Effect), F/M, Family, Family Secrets, Fluff and Angst, Friendship, Friendship/Love, Healing, Hospitalization, Hurt/Comfort, Mental Health Issues, Physical Therapy, Post-Mass Effect 3, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Sole Survivor (Mass Effect), Team Bonding, Therapy, friends - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-20
Updated: 2020-06-20
Packaged: 2021-03-03 23:42:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,138
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24824014
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blueroses_11/pseuds/blueroses_11
Summary: The moment – thesecond– he finally arrived there for the first time and fell into her embrace in the hospital room, she seemed lost to him all over again. It was her, but it wasn’t. She was silent. Unwilling. Guilty of every little thing that could never have been her fault.•It’s been months since the Reapers were taken down. The road to recovery is twisted.
Relationships: Kaidan Alenko & Female Shepard, Kaidan Alenko/Female Shepard
Kudos: 7





	Ignition

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: Hello and thank you for reading :] it truly means the world to me. It has been a while since I’ve done some real writing so I hope somebody finds this interesting haha. When I started writing this I planned for it to be some sort of one-shot, but it developed into what I think could become something bigger and greater. This features my paragon Shep, who is in a rather vulnerable state after the war. I have so many ideas on how to expand on this and I cannot wait for you all to follow the journey with me if you would like to! Thank you again and enjoy!!!! :]

“Now, I know not to pry, but what exactly _happened_ up there?”

He looked her in the eyes, an inquisitive look, or perhaps a look of innocent curiosity, nonetheless one she was quick to recognize. It was often hard to tell with him, to get to the root of his intentions. “What _happened_? What do you mean what happened?” she replied. Her arms uncrossed and fell to her sides, palms pressed to the sheets as she sat up in the hospital bed she’d been calling home for the last however many months. “You know.” It was an odd question, one she wouldn’t have expected from him. From others, however, it was a question she could hardly escape. Destroying the reapers wasn’t something she, nor anybody else, could quickly forget.

She had a complicated relationship with the memories of it. She wished she could’ve been ecstatic to see the end of the war, but after chasing them for years, seeing the victories and the losses up close, she struggled to see it all in a positive light. It was emotionally draining, thinking it all over in the days since she last cheated death, and she was _exhausted_. Despite having hardly walked more than a few steps, or moved around at all, or really even spoken.

“Kaidan?” He sat in a seat at the right side of her bed, two fingers lightly tapping the edge of the plastic bed railing. He had still not answered her question. “What do you mean?”

He tore his eyes away from hers for a moment, glancing past her head – presumably out the open door to her left – then met her gaze again. “I mean… You haven’t talked a lot about it, Adley.” He let out a sigh, quietly, one he’d been holding in while he spoke. He’d used her name – her real name – for the first time in what felt like a lifetime. She was okay with saying goodbye to ‘Shepard’ for a while. She had no reason to don the name and feel like a hero in the moment. “You don’t have to keep it to yourself. Let me in that head of yours, you know?” His hand dropped from the railing, and he took hers in his palm as he forced a smile, wiggling her hand gently from side to side, as if trying to shake loose any bit of the personality he had fallen in love with long before.

Silence fell over the two of them once again, and Adley fell deep into her thoughts. She remembered reaching the beam and being presented with a number of choices, all of which made her heart ache in a different way. She remembered the instant she decided to be selfish and put her mission over everything else, and the tinge of guilt that plagued every step she took toward the glowing red light. She remembered pain, confusion, as she was pulled from the rubble, knowing surely there was no reason she should have survived.

It hurt to think about. Even months later, she still couldn’t give herself a break.

“I just… I got there and I knew what to do. I knew that was it,” she finally said, not keen on the idea of going into much detail on the event.

“You knew?” Kaidan replied almost immediately, his eyebrows raised. He looked surprised – but by what? Of course, she knew. She’d known all along. He was likely more responsive to something he’d been thinking, but had not said, rather than her meek answer. Regardless, Adley nodded. “You knew it would end like this?” he continued.

“No, I knew I was going to die.” It was true. She knew she had to destroy the reapers, but by no means did she believe she would actually live to see a world without them. Kaidan tilted his head down to the ground, closing his eyes. Adley looked to her side again, to the spot where their hands rested. His hand gripped hers just a little tighter. “But I didn’t. I don’t think I did, at least. Part of me thought I’d earned a Heaven a little nicer than this.” She would’ve had more visitors by now, had this really been the afterlife. Maybe Mordin would’ve stopped in by now. Maybe Ashley, or Thane. Maybe some of her crew lost on Akuze would’ve stuck their heads through the door and made a joke about how life had finally taken her down. Maybe her parents would’ve been sitting by her side, or maybe Anderson would be slowly healing as well, stationed in a hospital bed right beside her.

God, did it hurt. It was a heart-splitting ache that wouldn’t go away.

“No. No, you’re still here,” he told her, shaking his head and looking back up to her. “I mean, I don’t know if that’s comforting to you anymore. But you are.”

Adley felt as if the air had caught in her airway for a moment, a pressure building at the back of her throat as she considered his words. She didn’t know whether to confirm or deny his speculation, so she didn’t.

She had already said all she wanted to say on the matter. She knew what had to be done, no matter the price, no matter the ‘what-if’ scenarios that would probe their way into her brain afterwards. And yet, here she was.

The silence continued like this for a while, Adley imagining being with those she had loved and lost again, Kaidan rehearsing his remaining questions in his head, grasping for any possible way of decently finding an answer to them. It killed him not to know what was killing her. He yearned to know every last detail of every painful moment of her life, to be able to unknot them each, one thread at a time, and lay things straight for her. But, she preferred to keep it under wraps, as she had her whole life, and so, that was how it had to be.

“Do you ever miss home, Ad?” The one to speak next was Kaidan. His thumb traced tiny circles on the back of her hand. His touch, gentle, calming, always made her feel at home, no matter how far away she could be. It was hard to miss what was right there in front of her.

“The Normandy?” she asked him, narrowing her eyes slightly as her words looped in her head. The name sounded almost foreign to her ears. It felt like it’d been so long. She would’ve believed it if someone told her it’d been a full lifetime since she’d stepped inside of it. She missed the energy of the ship, the constant buzzing and anticipation, every moment spent with her closest companions, those heartfelt and downright depressing. It was home to some of her worst days, but also some of her best. She had a lot to owe to the ship. Miraculously, she found the smallest of smiles stretched across her lips.

“No. Mindoir.” Her smile was short-lived, for it fell away as quickly as it had come – as soon as Kaidan spoke these words, every happy memory in her mind fled. The light left her eyes.

Adley hadn’t planned on diving headfirst into those memories again. Nor had she made it a habit to do so on any normal day. It was ages ago. She was no longer the young, scared, helpless girl she was back then. But God, she’d be the biggest liar if she said it didn’t still tear her apart.

Kaidan, on the other hand, regretted asking immediately. It was just stupid. It was cruel, forcing these thoughts into her head all over again. His job was to bring her sense of purpose back, not make her cry, damnit. Seeing her expression fall, a look of complete defeat shadowing her scarred features, was heartbreaking. He took it personally.

Taking in as big of a breath as she could manage, Adley spoke again. “Kaidan, you know I would’ve done anything to save them.” She bit down on her lip and shook her head. How could she go on? She couldn’t. Not like this. She looked up to Kaidan, as if prompting some type of response from him – hopefully even another change of topic – but he continued to stare back, lips sealed. His eyes scanned hers, up and down, peering into her like she truly had something to hide. Every sign told her he wanted her to be in this position. Vulnerable with nothing else – nobody else – to turn to. He was pressing her to go on. He knew not to push her to talk about it, so why did he? He never would’ve done this on the Normandy. She kept that part of her own history wrapped up tightly, in a part of her she’d vowed to not often visit. Her nightmares had spawned discussion of it on one or two occasions, but this? This felt wrong. She felt the tension in her throat return, her skin burned hot, her vision began to blur. She blinked back tears promptly as she pulled away from his hold, lacing her fingers together in her lap and turning her head to gaze into a far corner of the room. “Why are you doing this?” she asked in a soft and almost childish voice. She’d turned into such a weakling. Such a miserable, emotional excuse. She wouldn’t cry; she couldn’t let herself do it, although her heart screamed at her to just let loose. Adley could hardly believe the person she’d become.

“You are unstable. In the doctor’s eyes, you’re unstable.” Kaidan had no choice but to be transparent at this point. It was harsh – he had some doubts about it – but he knew her, and she was better off this way. Sugarcoating it meant more questions from her. Getting the point across early on would be best for her. So, he continued. “There is no way in Hell you’re getting out of here like this. You don’t have a care in the world, you’re outright depressed, and they can’t do their jobs until you do yours. You haven’t given anybody a single goddamn thing to work with.” Adley was just about floored. Seeing the one she loved burst like a balloon stretched thin with too much air – it was almost scary. But his voice wasn’t condescending. He didn’t speak in a way that matched what he was saying. His voice remained smooth, low, honest but as calm as before. “They’re trying to help you and aren’t letting them, so why won’t you just try it? Let them in, Adley. Don’t shut them out. Don’t shut me out.”

She couldn’t breathe. A second passed – two, three, maybe more – where she felt entirely paralyzed. Her hip which normally ached consistently, no matter how she’d sit, felt more numb than injured. The cold air stung at her wet eyes, freezing them, ice cold. In an instant, her face grew hot. Her insides turned. Her hands curled into fists, fingers no longer intertwined but fists held close to one another. The feeling of her fingernails digging into the flesh of her palms snapped her back into the present moment.

“Who told you this? Who’s talked to you?” _Your_ _doctor_ , Kaidan had replied soon after, adding that some words from the therapist assigned to her had been relayed through the doctor to him, as well. She was _angry_. “Do they think I’m just a sack of meat for them to poke at? Am I useless to them?” Adley scoffed. “Give it to me straight. I’m not playing games.”

How _dare_ they put it on him? They had a problem with her, so they figured they could use _Kaidan_ like a toy to get through to her? It was offensive – pathetic – and it made her blood boil to know that they’d actually thought putting the unnecessary stress on him was the way to fix things. She would die before letting them put their problems – or hers – on him.

“So, they figured they’re so shitty at their own jobs, they can’t even sit and talk to a patient themselves? Kaidan, why are you letting them play you like this? What the _hell_?” She sat up straighter in the bed, about ready to swing her legs off the sheets and find her doctors herself. Of course, she wouldn’t have made it very far, had she actually done it. She just wanted to scream.

“Ad, that’s _not_ it, it’s not like that. You don’t…” Kaidan’s efforts to calm her trailed off momentarily as he stumbled over his words. “This isn’t on them, it’s on _me_. You’re so damn shut off, from everybody, it’s _mindboggling_. How can any of them expect you to listen to what they say when you won’t even listen to _me_? It’s me. You know me, Ad, so why are you so afraid of just letting yourself live?”

A tear made its way down her cheek. And that was the whole story.

It was no longer an option for her to hide every bad day behind a smile, mask every new scar with a heavier piece of armor.

All she needed to do was try. Show them she could try to fix herself, and she would be on the right track. Perhaps she shouldn’t have judged Kaidan’s words so quickly.

“Fine,” she sighed, wiping her cheek with the back of her hand. “I want to talk to them. I need to hear from them what they need me to do.”

Kaidan – visibly dumbfounded by her sudden change in stance – rose from his chair and let his hand rest on her shoulder for a brief moment before exiting the room. The door slid shut. His absence was accompanied by silence. A faint beeping of monitors and voices scattered throughout the hall, but there was quiet. Her eyes shut, bowing her head to meet her chin to her chest. “ _Shit_.”

God, she was pissed. She hardly knew why.

She was exhausted by the conversation, heart still beating fast after raising her voice. She was weak. No stronger than a child who couldn’t handle confrontation.  
Adley didn’t know what to say, or what to expect. She didn’t know who Kaidan even left to find. She hadn’t thought that far ahead. Actually, she’d hardly thought about it at all when she said it.

She ran her hands through her hair once, clenched one wrist tightly with the other hand, and took a deep breath. Why was she so angry? She wanted more than anything to get out of the bed and run far away. Maybe to her apartment, maybe to the Normandy, or wherever else a split-second decision would take her. Hell, she could barely even walk. She was just so _trapped_. The only thing missing was a pair of handcuffs or two to chain her down to the bed.

Whenever she would think her temper was dealt with, she would remember Kaidan again. His obligation to help her – the fact he even had to feel the need to do that. It was enough to drive her nearly to insanity. He’d truly believed convincing her to speak her thoughts himself would convince her to tell her therapist the same things. None of it made any sense to Adley. She would trust Kaidan with her life; but, for her own good, she decided on keeping her mouth shut when it came to anything that could cause any additional pain, to herself or to him. Would she trust a doctor with her life, though? Oddly enough, she was leaning towards no. Therapy was borderline inhumane. The mere thought of it was a terrible experience. Adley was content with taking it all to the grave.

She was startled by the sound of the door sliding open, though her eyes remained closed, head tilted down. “Adelaide Shepard?” She recognized the voice but couldn’t immediately place a name to it. She didn’t bother opening her eyes just yet. “Dr. Ledari.” _That_ was it. Ledari. She knew she must have come in often enough for her to know the name, despite all the names of other doctors she’d likely forgotten by that point, or perhaps never even learned in the first place.

“Yes,” she said. “This is easier for me if I keep my eyes shut.” So, she did.

“I understand you would like to speak with me?”

Adley let out a sigh, nodded her head quickly. Fuck, what was she supposed to say? She hadn’t decided how to approach it yet. She sat in silence for another moment, then suddenly muttered a few more words, deciding on them the instant she opened her mouth: “ _Who do you think you are_?”

She was an asshole. For no reason at all. With her luck, she would turn out to be the one completely in the wrong. But she was angry; she wasn’t going to hide it.

“I’m … I’m sorry?” the doctor stuttered in response. Adley would have imagined a shocked look on the doctor’s face, had she only remembered what she looked like. She opened her eyes, looked up, and took it all in.

The doctor was an asari. She looked young, innocent, scared. She wouldn’t have been able to pick her out of a lineup by name, but something about her face triggered something in her memory, yet she didn’t know exactly what. She’d seen her before – that, she had already confirmed earlier – and that was as far as her care for the matter would go.

Kaidan wasn’t in the room. He likely would have interjected as soon as possible, before the doctor could even respond.

“Why do you need to talk to me, and why do I need to talk to you?” Adley asked. Her attempts to keep her voice strong almost succeeded, but she heard her voice waver slightly at the end of her question. This conversation was absolutely insane, and in all honesty, she almost started to feel bad for even initiating it. “What is your job? What are they telling you about me that makes you think you need to be here?” She continued regardless.

“I’m licensed for therapy. Talking out our problems helps in the long run. If you need anything, I’m always here, otherwise I’ll drop in regularly on my own,” she explained. She didn’t understand how it could be helpful. No words could bring her family back, or her friends, or reverse anything that had ever happened to them. Talking did more harm than good, in her experience. Adley almost nodded, just out of kindness, for taking up the doctor’s time with a talk that would benefit neither of them, but in a turn of the tide, just as she had done minutes prior, she called bullshit on Ledari’s next statement. “If you are so curious, they’ve told me you are… despondent. Maybe unwilling. Refusing aid. A good way to think of this is that we recognize the problem, find the source of it, and work through it together.”

“ _Problem_?” Adley said, almost at a shout, waiting not a single second to speak. “The problem? The problem being me?” She swore she could hear her heartbeat pounding in her ears. She wanted nothing more than to unleash something heavy on her and send her out of the room with bruises to show for it.

Ledari’s eyes grew wide, her head shook slowly, attempting to backtrack before potentially making things any worse. “No. No, Adelaide, it isn’t like that. I-I don’t think that the source of the problem is – “

“I can think of a thousand sources of the problem, and you’re one of them.”

The doctor stopped and froze, staring straight back at her. She took a step in the direction of the door, but just as Adley thought she was leaving, Ledari’s babbling continued again. Apologies, further attempts at clarification. She refused to give up on her so easily, it seemed, but Adley had heard enough.

“You can fuck off, Dr. Ledari.”

Her words prompted the doctor’s jaw to drop. Was she in disbelief? Was she mad? Dr. Ledari appeared to compose herself, and within a matter of seconds, she had held her hands behind her back, turned, and walked out of the room.

Adley felt a chill run down her spine. God, she felt like she was going to be sick.

The conversation played itself over in her head like an old home vid on repeat. Did she _actually_ say all that? Was Ledari going to do something about it? She almost felt bad for everything. She did feel bad. She couldn’t think of anything else she would have rather said, though. What happened to her? She asked herself what had possessed her to turn into such an asshole. It was simply unlike her, but to be fair, nothing in the present moment was normal at all.

Kaidan entered the room quietly and closed the door. It was clear he had been waiting outside for the two of them to be finished.

He hadn’t believed it at first when word spread that Shepard had survived. His head spun as he held onto a shred of hope that she was alive, but being told it was the truth? At that point, being assured it was reality, he couldn’t wrap his head around it. He couldn’t believe it. But somehow, the moment – the _second_ – he finally arrived there for the first time and fell into her embrace in the hospital room, she seemed lost to him all over again. It was her, but it wasn’t. She was silent. Unwilling. Guilty of every little thing that could never have been her fault.

Now, here she was, only seconds removed from her last argument, and the silence had fallen over her again.

“I’m… sorry.” She breathed the words, as if taking in every bit of its meaning. She sounded defeated, and Kaidan had to think twice about how the hell he was going to make it okay. This voice was unlike anything he’d heard coming from her. In all the years they’d spent together. “I don’t want to talk to Ledari.” He’d been praying for it to go well. He didn’t want to say he was disappointed, but there weren’t many other ways to describe it. Frankly, it was sad. “I think I messed up.”

Her words kindled a fire under own guilt. “I mean, I…” He couldn’t even justify it. He couldn’t put it lightly, nor could he unleash every last one of his thoughts on her with no regards to her sensitivity. It was a situation that would be difficult to get out of. Rather than returning to his chair at the side of the bed, he took a seat beside her on the bed’s edge. “You need to talk to us. Doc wants you to talk. I – she needs you to. I know you don’t want to. God, I _know_ it’s hard to and we can’t blame you for it. But you need to show us that you care because they’re getting worried,” – and he lifted a hand to trace his fingers across her cheek – “I’m getting worried.”

 _Worried_? A ringing in her ears pierced the stillness that fell between them. “Why?”

“You are Commander Shepard.” He had a response ready this time, it seemed. He spoke more forcefully, but the soft tone to his voice somehow remained. “You are Adley Shepard, damnit.” Adley... She was beginning to hate this ‘Adley’ persona more and more with each passing second. “But above all else you are _human_ , Ad, and humans are tough – especially you – but even then, humans need time to heal.” Her heart fell a little deeper into her chest. “Especially you.” He spoke his final words in a whisper.

Adley would have replied. Somehow. But she didn’t know how. She didn’t want to agree. She didn’t want to even think about whether it was worth it to.

This period of silence didn’t last long. Kaidan made sure of it. “You scared away your therapist, Shep,” he told her softly, a gruff laugh studding the end of it. “What’re you supposed to do now?”

This managed to pull a chuckle out of her, too, but as soon as the laugh dissipated, the smile slipped away in suit. He thought he caught sight of a tear falling from her eye.

“Ad.” Kaidan spoke again, just loud enough for her to hear. “You okay?”

Adley nodded her head quickly and another smile emerged. A sad smile, uneven, uncurved, but undoubtedly with effort.

As he looked into her eyes, a second tear fell down her cheek, carving a new path right beside the first.

Kaidan reached an arm around Adley and pulled her closer. Her head came to rest perfectly on his shoulder.

He held her as she cried.


End file.
